He nearly gaped at her. Intimidating? Him? He was so stunned at that assessment it took him a moment to realize that this was the first time she’d called him by name to his face. He’d assumed she had a few choice, less socially acceptable terms for him that she politely didn’t use in front of Quinn and Hayley, and so didn’t refer to him specifically at all.

“Adam, you said you’d worked with Greg on the car before?” Quinn asked.

Adam’s throat was suddenly too tight to speak. Those were some of his best memories of Greg. So he only nodded. He heard Amanda make a small sound, and yet another memory flooded his weary brain, the day Amanda had come home for something she’d forgotten in her move to her new place, a condo about fifteen miles north of Seattle, on the other end of the ferry ride from the more rural side where Foxworth was situated. She’d been loath to leave her father living alone, but Greg had convinced her on her twenty-third birthday it was time for her to stretch her wings.

He’d been there working with Greg on putting a new set of spark plugs and wires in the car. It had been a hot summer day, and he’d pulled his shirt off after about an hour. And when she’d pulled up in the little SUV her father had picked out for her for its safety record, he’d considered finding wherever he’d tossed it and putting it back on, except that it seemed a little obvious. And in the next moment he didn’t know whether to be glad or regret that he hadn’t, because the appreciative look she gave him had brought on a tangle of reactions in him that he never had been able to properly sort out.

If I’d known you were here, I would have stopped by sooner.

If I knew you stopped by, I’d come more often.

The unexpected, flirtatious exchange had made him feel impossibly awkward, with her father standing right there. He’d been wishing he hadn’t teased her back when he caught Greg’s assessing look at him. But then his partner had grinned at them both, made a comment about suddenly feeling like a third wheel, and the tension had vanished.

“When we get it home to her, that can be your cover, then,” Quinn said, snapping him out of the reverie. And slamming home to him that he would be back at that house. Greg’s house. His gut tightened.

“I really don’t think all this is necessary,” Amanda protested again.

“We’ll stay out of your way,” Hayley promised. “We’ll just be around, just in case.”